John 6:34

Joh_6:34-35

Lord, evermore give us this bread

I.

THE VAIN PRAYER. Because

1. It recognizes not the Giver in the bread.

2. It recognizes not the Bread of Life in the giver.

II. THE ANSWER OF JESUS aims to disclose their spirit

1. By insisting on the figure of the bread in His person.

2. By enlarging the figure: bread for hunger and thirst.

3. By explaining the figure: Come to Me, Believe on Me. (J. P.Lange, D. D.)

Three sayings of Christ

I. ABOUT HIMSELF (Joh_6:35).

II. ABOUT THOSE WHO COME TO HIM (Joh_6:37).

III. ABOUT THE WILL OF HIS FATHER (Joh_6:39-40). (Bp. Ryle.)

The true hunger of the soul awakened and satisfied in Christ

I. MANS HUNGER. There is in every finite existence one great appetite. No creature is independent; it must draw life from another. In man, who is a complex being, there are various kinds of hunger.

1. Natural.

(1) Bodily hunger. Even as an upright creature man was made dependent on the fruits of the ground; and now his first question is, How am I to get bread. How much thought and labour are expended on it! It has impelled to every crime. Hunger pressed Israel into Egypt, and that involved mighty issues for both. Hunger brought Ruth into view and linked her with the royal ancestry of Christ. The greatest spiritual conflict in the world was connected with a state of hunger. The central petition of the Lords prayer is Give us this day, etc.

(2) Mental hunger. Mans bodily appetite is typical of mental conditions.

(a) The heart hungers for happiness. Man, when left to himself, is an unhappy being.

(b) The intellect hungers for truth. Man has been made to inquire into, study, and know the truth of things.

(c) The will hungers for liberty. The triumph of a mans life is to prevail over the conditions which would fetter him.

(d) The conscience hungers for righteousness. We are made to act in accordance with the supreme law of the universe, the will of God. All altars, sacrifices, priesthoods are witnesses to that.

2. Unnatural. Great multitudes, instead of seeking for legitimate satisfaction, lay hold of false food, and drug themselves. For these Satan keeps a great variety of delusions.

(1) For low natures coarse animal pleasures.

(2) For intellectual natures there are the sciences, etc.

(3) For light and giddy natures there is the world and all its glory.

(4) For ambitious natures, principalities and powers.

(5) For more serious and half-religious natures penancies, pilgrimages, rites, ceremonies, and good works. The result of eating such false bread is that the mere hunger of the soul is deadened, and a false appetite created, which grows with what it feeds on, and this bread of death instead of supporting the soul consumes it.

3. Supernatural; the longings which exist with any degree of strength only in the renewed nature. Along with the other tastes there may be a love of sin, but this partly consists of a hatred of sin and a love of all that is good, a counting of all things but loss, so that we may gain Christ.

II. THE DIVINE PROVISION.

1. On what ground does God provide for our bodily hunger? For the sake of Christ. He has tasted death for every man, and thus secured an ample day of grace and every blessing, temporal as well as spiritual. Thus in a literal sense Christ is the Bread of Life.

2. Christ is the true food for the human mind.

(1) We can only see the true beauty and deep spiritual meaning of nature through Him.

(2) He is the Bread of Life to the conscience. In Him the sins of the past are washed away and the law magnified and made honourable.

(3) He is the Bread of Life to the heart. The heart that loves not is dead--but Jesus has revealed and communicates the love of God. (F. Ferguson, D. D.)

Bread and water

You call these common things. Their excellence has occasioned their commonness, and their commonness corresponds to a common want in humanity.

I. LET US APPLY THIS SOCIALLY. Look on the greatest feast ever prepared. What are its delicacies? Simply an adaptation, decoration or adulteration of bread and water, and the seated guests are compelled to say, This is well enough now and then, but only now and then, let us have something plain. Bread and water survive. Empires of soups, etc., which are the image and superscription of the cooks, who is bound like other fashionable slaves to produce something fresh, rise and fall; but bread and water are Gods, and they endure.

II. THE APPLICATION OF THIS IS OBVIOUS IN THE HIGHER SPHERES OF CULTURE. Reading and writing are the bread and water of the mind. Your duty to your child is done when you have given this; let him get the rest for himself. But fine cookery is imitated in fine intelligence, and sometimes with like results--mental indigestion. Hence we have imperfect French, caricatured German, and murdered music, and the native tongue and history passed by. When will people learn to prize bread and water and see that it is better to know a little well, than to know next to nothing about a great deal?

III. THESE ILLUSTRATIONS PREPARE FOR THE HIGHEST TRUTH OF ALL, viz., that Jesus Christ is the bread and water, without which man cannot live. He never says that He is a luxury which the rich only can afford. An adventurer would not have seen in metaphors so humble a philosophy so profound.

1. Man needs Christ as a necessity and not as a luxury. You may be pleased to have flowers, but you must have bread. Jesus has often been presented as an ornament, a phenomenon; but He preached Himself, and would have others preach Him, as bread and water.

2. What has been the effect of omitting to declare Christ as bread and water? Leaving the simplicity of Christ, we have elaborated theological sciences, worked out a cunning symbolism, filled the Church with many coloured garments, and constituted splendid hierarchies. All this means that man is a fool, and prefers vanity to truth. Poor souls are left to believe that they can only get to Christ through priests, catechisms, and ecclesiastical mumbling. Take the pure Bible and read it for thyself, and thou shalt see the Lord and eat heavenly bread.

3. History furnishes a most graphic confirmation of these views. J.S. Mill says: Let rational criticism take from us what it may, it still leaves us the Christ. Exactly: it leaves us bread. It modifies the theological cook and confectioner, but it leaves the living water. Men cant get rid of Christ, because they cant get rid of themselves. The Lord allows the chaff to be blown away, but saves every grain of wheat; yet nervous people think that the wheat is lost because the chaff is scattered. (J. Parker, D. D.)

Bread the symbol of Christ

He is to the soul what bread is to the body--its food.

I. Bread is NECESSARY food. Other things may be dispensed with, but all need bread,

II. It is food that SUITS all--old and young, weak and strong.

III. It is the most NOURISHING kind of food: nothing does so much good or is so indispensable to bodily development.

IV. It is food that we NEED DAILY. Other foods are at best only occasionally required.

V. It is the only food we are NEVER TIRED OF; hence it is on every table, unlike every other kind of food. (Bp. Ryle.)

The bread of life a representation of the Saviour

1. All life is valuable in its degree. Vegetable life is superior to dead matter, animal to vegetable life, rational to animal, the life of God to human life.

2. This latter was mans once; but it was forfeited, and is now restored by the Spirit. Hence Scripture loves to present religion under the notion of life; not as a picture that is only resemblance, not as mechanism that is only form.

3. The relation in which Christ stands to this life. He is bread, its nourishment; bread, i.e., bruised corn. He becomes our Saviour by His death.

4. Bread is nothing to us unless eaten, so unless we eat the flesh of the Son of God, etc.

I. THE WAY IN WHICH WE DERIVE ADVANTAGE FROM HIM. By coming to Him or believing on Him.

1. This reminds us that Christ is accessible. Where two or three, etc.

2. It teaches us that faith is not a notion, but a principle always attended with an application of the soul to the Redeemer.

3. This application is not a single address, but a continued exercise. Cometh.

II. THE HAPPINESS HIS FOLLOWERS SHALL ENJOY.

1. They shall never hunger nor thirst again after the world. Having tasted the provisions of Gods house, their language is, Lord, ever more give us this bread. A covetous, sensual, ambitious Christian is one the Scripture knows nothing of.

2. They shall not hunger and thirst in vain. The new creature has appetites, but ample provision is made for them.

3. They shall not hunger and thirst always. The days of imperfect enjoyment will soon be over.

Conclusion; The subject is a standard by which we may estimate

1. Christ.

2. Faith.

3. The Christian. (W. Jay.)

The bread of life

I. IN WHAT SENSE IS OUR LORD THE BREAD OF LIFE?

1. He evidently intimated that there was in Him that which, if properly received, would communicate eternal life (Joh_6:51; Joh_6:53).

2. He obviously points to His sufferings and death as that from which we were to derive our life.

3. For Him to be to us the bread of life depends on two things

(1) That we receive the full pardon of our sins;

(2) that we have a meetness for glory by the sanctification of our souls.

II. WHO ARE THOSE WHO DERIVE BENEFIT FROM HIM? Not all, but only those who come in faith.

1. Before we can do this we must have a sense of our need of Him.

2. Those will not come to Him who fail to see His perfections, believe in His atonement, and hear His invitation.

3. There must be moral effort. Labour. We must evidently turn our backs resolutely on the sins we loved.

4. We must come to Him by the prescribed means--meditation on His Word and importunate prayer.

III. WHAT IS THE BENEFIT of which He speaks. The believer shall never hunger or thirst

1. After sin.

2. Nor anxiously after holiness; only with such a sweet desire as serves to animate the spirit on its road to that state where it will thirst no more. (B. Noel, M. A.)

Bread is for common use

I remember what bread was to me when I was a boy. I could not wait till I was dressed in the morning, but ran and cut a slice from the loaf--all the way round, too--to keep me until breakfast; and at breakfast, if diligence in eating earned wages, I should have been well paid. And then I could not wait for dinner, but ate again, and then at dinner; and I had to eat again before tea, and at tea, and lucky if I didnt eat again after that. It was bread, bread, all the time with me, bread that I lived on and got strength from. Just so religion is the bread of life; but you make it cake--you put it away in your cupboard and never use it but when you have company. You cut it into small pieces and put it on china plates, and pass it daintily round instead of treating it as bread, common, hearty bread, to be used every hour. (H. W. Beecher.)

The soul needs to be often fed

When people are being strengthened of God, they are not content with one meal on the Sabbath; they want another, and perhaps a prayer-meeting or a Sunday-school for a dessert. They are not content with just two or three minutes prayer in the morning; they like, if they can, to slip out of business and get a word with God in the middle of the day. They delight to carry a text of Scripture in their memories to sweeten their breath all the day, and they cannot be happy unless they meditate upon the Word. I think you make a great mistake when you go galloping through the whole Bible, reading half a dozen chapters every day; you do much better when you get a text and ruminate upon it, just as the cows chew the cud. Turn the Scripture over and over, and get all the juice, sweetness, and nourishment out of it, and you will do well. The spiritually hungry man says, I must go and hear some servant of God, and hear what God, the Lord, will speak to me. I must get as much of the heavenly food as I possibly can, for I need it so greatly. (C. H.Spurgeon.)

Hunger a sign of health

Men who are mending find themselves hungry between meals. Oh, the doctor says, that is a capital sign. You will get on now. I love to see Gods people when the Lord is strengthening them, for then they leave off being dainty and fault-finding, and prove the truth of Solomons proverb, that to the hungry man every bitter thing is sweet. Then they come to Monday night prayer-meetings and week evening services. They used to be able to do very well from Sunday to Sunday, and I have known some of them get on with one meal on the Lords day, and like it all the better if that was quickly served and soon over. When the gracious Lord strengthens His people they become very sharp-set. Somebody said on Sunday morning to me, Did you not feel it sweet preaching? I replied, I always feel it sweet preaching the gospel of the grace of God. Ah, but, he said, the people swallowed it all just as it came from your mouth, and they seemed so hungry after it. Truly this makes a preacher happy. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Christ the best food

The old Grecians that had fed altogether on acorns before, after that bread came in amongst them they made no reckoning of their mast any more, but kept it only for swine. And leathern and iron money began to grow out of request amongst the Lacedemonians after that gold and silver came into use. So when a man hath once found the favour of God in his heart, and the love of God in Christ hath once lighted on it, and got assurance of it, he ceaseth then to be greedy of the worlds trash, which is in regard of it but dross or pebble-stones to gold and diamonds, as mast to the best bread corn; yea, rather of far less worth or value to that than either of these are to it. (Fuller.)

Feeding on Christ

If anybody were to say to me, I have a man at home who stands in my hall, and has stood there for years, but he has never eaten a mouthful of bread all the time, nor cost me a penny for food, I should say to myself, Oh, yes, that is a bronze man, I know, or a plaster cast of a man. He has no life in him, I am sure; for if he had life in him, he would have needed bread. If we could live without eating, it would be a cheap method of existence; but I have never found out the secret, and I do not mean to make experiments. If you are trying it, and have succeeded in it so far that you can live without Christ, the bread of life, I fear your life is not that of Gods people, for they all hunger and thirst after Jesus, the bread of heaven. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

False food

During the Irish famine of 1849 the Duke of Norfolk invented a curry-powder of which he boasted that if taken by the starving peasants it would destroy all cravings of hunger. How many remedies for the souls hunger arc mere mockeries of unsatisfying! Curry-powder is poor food at the best. (H. O. Mackey.)

Christ an incorruptible food

Christ is incorruptible meat and drink. All earthly meat and drink is of a fading, perishing nature. The best bread grows mouldy in a little time; the best flesh in time putrefies and taints; the best wine grows eager and sour in a little time, and becomes unfit for the body of man; the very manna itself, when it was kept till the morning of the next day, contrary to Gods command, bred worms, and stank (Exo_16:20). But Jesus Christ knows no corruption. His flesh and blood is now as sweet and pleasant, after so many ages, as it was the first hour it was eaten and drank (chap. 8:27). And it will be as far from corruption at the end of the world as now it is. The manna in the golden pot corrupted not, though kept for many generations. Christ is manna in that golden pot; the humanity in the golden pot of the Divinity shall see no corruption. (Ralph Robinson.)

Soul-satisfying bread

I. THE LORD JESUS IS TO BE RECEIVED BY EACH ONE OF US PERSONALLY FOR HIMSELF. Bread which is not eaten will not stay hunger. Water in the cup may sparkle, but it cannot slake thirst unless we drink it. How do we receive Christ.

1. By coming to Him, which represents the first act of faith. We return to the Christ from whom we have been alienated with a motion of the heart performed by desire, prayer, assent, consent, trust, obedience.

2. Believing on Him, in the sense of trusting Him.

3. Eating and drinking Him. It is monstrous that this should be taken literally, for what greater crime could there be than to eat the flesh of our Saviour? What He meant was receiving Him into our hearts. Now, in eating

(1) The food as a whole goes into our mouths; so as a whole Christ is received into our belief and trust.

(2) We masticate it, and even in this way the believer thinks of Jesus and discovers His preciousness.

(3) It descends into the inward parts to be digested; so Christ is to dwell and rest in the affections till His comfort is fully drawn forth.

(4) The food is next assimilated; so the great truths of Christ are inwardly received till our whole nature draws from them satisfaction and strength.

(5) As a man who has feasted well, and is no more hungry, rises from the table satisfied, so we feel that in our Jesus our entire nature has all it wants.

(6) The two points about Christ which He says are respectively meat and drink are

(a) His flesh, i.e., His humanity. Our soul feeds on the literal historical fact that God was in Christ, and was made flesh and dwelt among us.

(b) His blood, which clearly refers to His atoning death.

II. WHERE JESUS IS RECEIVED HE IS SUPREMELY SATISFYING

1. To our highest and deepest wants, not to mere fancies and whims. Hungering is no shame; thirst is not sentiment.

2. Christ meets the hungering of conscience, which feels that God must punish sin, but is appeased as it perceives that it has been punished in Christ.

3. Men, when awakened, have a hunger of fear, but when they find that Christ has died for them, fear expires and love takes its place.

4. The heart has its hunger, but in Christ its roving affections find rest.

5. There are vast desires in us all, and when we are quickened they expand, and yet are satisfied.

6. This perfect satisfaction is found only in Christ.

(1) Some have tried to be satisfied with themselves.

(2) Some have gone to Moses.

(3) Some have dosed themselves into a torpor with the narcotics of scepticism.

(4) Many stave off hunger by indifference, like the bears in winter, which are not hungry because they are asleep.

Conclusion: All believers bear witness that Jesus Christ is satisfying to them.

1. They never seek additional ground of trust beyond Christ.

2. They never want to shift their confidence.

3. Christ satisfies in the hour of death. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The I am of Christ

This form of expression is not found in the synoptists. It occurs not unfrequently in St. John, and the figures with which it is connected furnish a complete study of the Lords work.

I. I am the LIGHT OF THE WORLD (chap. 8:12).

II. I am the BREAD OF LIFE (verses 35, 41, 48, 51).

III. I am THE DOOR (10:7, 9).

IV. I am THE GOOD SHEPHERD (10:11, 14).

V. I am THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE (11:25).

VI. I am THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE (14:6). VII. I am THE TRUE VINE (14:1-5). (Bp. Westcott.)

Spiritual assimilation

It is not what a man eats, but what he digests, that nourishes him. Now, so it is with that truth which is food for the mind, which is the souls nutriment. There is a certain kind of truth which needs only to be heard, only to he received: facts about the sun or earth, about light and heat and electricity. All that you need to do in respect to these truths is to get them, to store them away in your mind. Thus, for instance, the sun is ninety-two millions of miles from the earth. Receive these facts, and you need go no farther with them. There is no necessary after process of assimilation. They are of themselves nourishment for the mind, without any such after process. But not so is it with moral truth--that truth designed to regulate and govern human action. This is worth nothing, unless it is wrought into the life; unless it be so assimilated as to lose the form of abstract truth, and become principle; unless it passes into, is converted into life. This is the way with bread, when it does any good. It does not remain bread. It turns to flesh and blood and bone. The bread of yesterday is the myriad-hued, the myriad-sided life of to-day. It is the eloquence of the orator, and the strength of the drayman. It is the skill of the artist, and the energy of the ploughman. And it is all this, through the wonderful process of assimilation, through the mysterious force of a transubstantiation, stranger than priest ever taught, or poet ever fancied. Now, the truth of this analogy furnishes an explanation of the fact that so many persons in the world have a great deal of Bible know- ledge, an abundance of moral truth, without having much of spiritual life. In such Cases, truth has remained truth. Doctrine lies within them, as so much doctrine. So moral truth remains as so much unassimilated knowledge in the minds of thousands. And this analogy, besides an explanation, suggests also the great duty we owe to our moral or spiritual being. It is this. The duty of assimilating the moral truth which we have received, of turning it into life. This should be our daily work. Is time nothing, and eternity everything? Do we believe this? Then we should be more careful for an estate there, than for building up one here. Is it true, that with- out holiness no one shall see the Lord? Do we believe this? If so, how important that this truth should be turned into a principle of action in our daily life. And we should come to place very little, if any, value upon the mere possession of truth. Many a post mortem examination discloses plenty of unused food within the body. Still, the man died--died, because his system did not take up and use the bread. So, many a post mortem moral examination, no doubt, will exhibit an abundance of moral truth within the soul. And farther than this I think we should go here. We should come to place comparatively little value upon doctrines, which we are unable to convert into life-force, from which we cannot gather spiritual guidance and strength. If the truth which we possess is not digestible, it is very poor stuff. But, without further amplification here, I ask your attention to the great matter suggested by the text--THE CONDITIONS OF SPIRITUAL ASSIMILATION.

1. And the first I mention is, something to be assimilated. The process denoted by this word is only the changing of one substance into another. Thus, the tree takes the air and the sun-light, and the rain, and turns them into tree, into roots and trunk, branches and fruit, into its own peculiar life. Every leaf on your vine in spring-time is an open mouth, asking for these surrounding substances, that it may convert them into life for itself. It does not want light and heat and moisture, as such. It does not lay them up as such, counting them treasures. No, but silently, surely, swiftly, it assimilates them to itself. The sunbeam, when your flower gets hold of it, is no longer a sunbeam. No; but it is blood in the veins of your rose, it is the blush upon its cheek, it is sweet odour filling the air. Now, not otherwise is it with the life of the soul. This life, like all others, grows by the process of assimilation. But there must be something to be assimilated; and what this something is the text distinctly affirms. It is Christ, who is the bread of life, the bread which is turned into life within the soul. Christ, and not something else; not philosophy, not art, not knowledge. Where in the history of the world has any of these supported moral life? Look at ancient Egypt, ancient Greece. Christ is its food; but this means the true Christ, and a whole Christ. The soul cannot live on the Pope, or what of Christ may come through the Pope. It needs a whole Christ. Then, again, take the case where Christ is shorn of His sympathy, of His boundless love, of His ineffable yearning, and the same result is apparent. The soul starves. Its bread again is only half bread. Then there is another half Christ, the sentimental one. A Christ who is no sin-bearer, who holds no relation to the Divine law as its atonement--a Christ, of whom it can, only by the widest possible metaphor, be said, that He was made a curse--a Christ with no blood I And the same sad result of spiritual life is here again witnessed. Souls are starved.

2. The second condition is a good moral atmosphere. This implies two things. First, that your homes should be favourable to Christian life; and second, that your daily business, outside the home, should be such and so conducted as to be the same. No church, no religious privileges, can do much for any man or woman, who either has no home, or whose home is a bad one. Why, suppose you only gave your body one or two hours a week of pure atmosphere. Could you preserve health? Could you live? If you go from the church into an atmosphere of frivolity and selfishness, of acrimony and impurity, you will be sure to arrest the process of spiritual assimilation. Shun evil and corrupt association. It is said that the Upas-tree is girt in with a circle of dead and rotting carcases of bird and beast. So, upon every side of these corrupt rings, are strewn the dead consciences, the lost souls of men. See to it, then, that you breathe the atmosphere of love and of kindness, of purity and of honesty, day by day.

3. The third condition of spiritual assimilation is activity, the exercise of the new and true life. Duty is a Divine and immutable condition of moral growth. He that saveth his life shall lose it. Selfish idleness will kill any soul. Something you must do for this world in which you live, if you would do the best for yourself.

4. A fourth condition of spiritual assimilation is thought, intelligence. Better believe half of what you do, intelligently, with your whole soul, than believe it all, languidly, ignorantly.

5. The last condition of spiritual assimilation which I mention, and the great one, is the presence of the vital principle--the vital principle which philosophy cannot find out, which chemistry cannot detect. See those two trees. One of them lifts up its bare and shrunken branches; the other is covered with leaves, and the birds sing among its branches. Yet the air, the sunshine, the moisture, all within reach of both of these trees. What makes the difference? Why, in one the vital principle is present, from the other it has departed. Take two members of the same family again. One stands before the cross, only to fall in worship. The other hunts through the soil, wet with the blood of the Saviour, for gold, and lifts up his face to blaspheme, when he finds it not. The cross is life to the one, but death remains in the case of the other.

Two or three remarks in conclusion.

1. It is Christ who is the Bread of Life--not the Church, not truth, not doctrines; but Christ the personal Christ.

2. Christ being the Bread of Life, character becomes a good test of the soundness of faith. He who is pure, who is Christlike in conduct, must have partaken of Him who is the only bread of such a life.

3. Many of us are daily guilty in this matter. We transgress, year after year, the plainest laws of spiritual health and of moral growth. (S. S. Mitchell, D. D.)

The Bread of Life

Every one acknowledges the golden cornfields to be full of the highest spiritual teaching. It is as if He who gave us the Written Word, which we call the Bible--the Book--specially designed the harvest-field to be to it a sort of companion volume; and to that purpose filled it to overflowing with the most striking and beautiful illustrations, which should be at the same time bright enough to catch the attention of the most untutored, and profound enough to richly repay the deepest study of the thoughtful and learned. Nor would our Saviour allow this beautiful supplementary volume to be neglected or overlooked. Let us listen for a moment to what science has to tell us of the character and position of corn in the economy of nature. Corn belongs to the second great order of plants--the lily order; and according to the evolutionists theory it is either a lilyin the making, or in a degenerate and degraded form. This latter theory is the generally accepted one. In process of the ages the corn-plant which was, and is still, of the lily order, gradually developed the invaluable property of producing corn, and did ibis at the expense of its beauty. It separated itself from its beautiful sisters, laid aside the glory of the coloured vesture and elegance which belonged to it as of right, and took instead the russet garments in which we see it now clad; and all in order that it might be of service in its day and generation, and give its own life and substance for the life and support of others. If this were so, what a wonderful little parable we have in its history of the law of self-sacrifice, and of the blessing and reward attending such sacrifice: for what if it that really happens to the corn as a result of its self-surrender? We call it now the staff of life. That is its usual and well-fitting title. To be singled out from all other plants in the world as the very staff of human life were, I say, marvellous honour for so small and insignificant a plant. But more than that; in giving its life as the staff of ours it, becomes itself a partaker of a nobler nature. In eating it we incorporate its nature with ours, so that it becomes part of our very selves--bone of our bones and flesh of our flesh--and in a very real sense it comes in this way to participate with us in theenjoyment of human life. What a striking illustration we have here, then, of some of our Saviours words! Jesus said, He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal; and the life-history of the corn emphasizes this truth in a way so remarkable that no one can help being impressed by it. But we have not exhausted this lesson even yet, nor have we reached a thousandth part of the honour God has designed to bestow upon the self-abasing little plant; for when the Lord Jesus Himself came down from heaven to give His life for the world, and one day stood and looked around Him for a figure by which He might signify something of His own Person and office, He could find nothing better to His purpose than the little corn-plant in its so-called degraded form and russet-dress. I am the Bread of Life, He said, I am the living Bread which came down from heaven. We can well appreciate the aptness of that simile. The plant that had laid aside its lily-dress, and put off all its glory--clothing itself in russet-brown, and stooping very low, that it might give its life for the many--and, moreover, that could even then only become life-giving bread by being first bruised and crushed and broken--I say we can well perceive how fitting a type in all these particulars it was of Him who made Himself of no reputation, etc. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him, etc. (John Crofts, M. A.)

The Bread of Life

1. Every living thing is a feeding thing. That it feeds is the test and signal that it lives.

2. Moreover, every living thing, whatever it may be, whether lowest in the scale of existence, or highest, must have food appropriate to itself, or it cannot live. There is a pathetic story which comes to us from the earlier explorations of the vast island of Australia. In the central deserts of that island there grows a strange plant called the nardoo, bearing leaves like clover. The Englishmen Burk and Wells, who were making these explorations, in the failure of other food, followed the example of the natives, and began to eat the leaves and roots of this plant named nardoo. It seemed to satisfy them; it seemed to fill them with a pleasant sense of comfort and repletion. But they grew weaker every day, and more emaciated; they were not hungry, for the plant seemed to satisfy the calling of hunger. But all the effects of an unfilled hunger began to appear in them; their flesh wasted from their bones, their strength leaked till they scarcely had the energy of an infant; they could not crawl on in their journey more than a mile or two a day. At last one of them perished of star- vation; the other was rescued in the last extremity of it. On analysis, it was discovered that the bread made of this plant lacked an element essential to the sustenance of a European. And so, even though they seemed fed, the explorers wasted away, and one of them died, because they were feeding on a sustenance inappropriate.

3. Now all this is true of mans higher and moral nature. The mistake men are constantly making is, that they seek to feed their higher nature upon wrong food, which may satisfy for the time, but in the long run cannot keep back the pangs of a noble spiritual hunger.

4. This is what Christ came into the world to be to men--the appropriate, satisfying, sustaining, upbuilding food for their highest nature.

(1) Christ, the Bread of Life, feeds and fills the human hunger for Divine sympathy.

(2) Divine forgiveness.

(3) Divine helping.

Lessons:

1. Do not refuse the Bread of Life because there are some things in Him you cannot understand, any more than you refuse the bread upon your tables, though there are mysteries in it that no science can explain.

2. See the adaptation to our needs of the great truth of our Lords Divine-human nature. He could not be the Bread of Life to us did He not possess such a nature.

3. Learn the essential meaning of religion. The essential meaning of my physical life is, that I come into contact with food. The essential meaning of my religious life is, that I as really and as utterly come into the Food of my spiritual nature--Christ. (W. Hoyt, D. D.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh 6:34-35. Then said they, Evermore give us this bread — On which it seems our life depends: let us always live upon this heavenly manna. Thus said some of the wiser and better part of them, though they did not yet fully understand his meaning. Jesus said unto them — Proceeding to give them a clear and full explication of the important truth he spoke of; I am the bread of life — Having life in myself, and giving life to all that believe in me: nor is bread so necessary to the support of your bodies, as a believing regard to me is to the life of your souls. He that cometh unto me shall never hunger — Shall not be destitute of spiritual nourishment; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst — Shall find the most restless desires of his soul satisfied, and being conscious of having already received the noblest refreshment and nourishment, shall grow up to a state of complete and everlasting satisfaction and enjoyment. To come to him, and believe on him, are equivalent expressions; or are corresponding terms, explaining each other. Thus our Lord assigned one of the many reasons why he called himself the bread of life. See Joh 6:47-51. The conclusion from this part of his discourse was so evident, that he left his hearers to draw it for themselves. It was this, “Since matters are so, I am evidently greater than Moses, even in respect of that for which you extol him most. He gave your fathers manna, which was bodily food only, and nourished nothing but the natural life. But I am myself the bread of life and food of the soul, making men both immortal and happy.”

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

6:34 Sir, . . . give us that bread: This request parallels the request of the Samaritan woman (4:15). Spiritual awakening begins with a request for God’s gift.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Joh 6:34. Κύριε, Lord) They speak with some degree of reverence, as at Joh 6:25 [Rabbi]; and even faith itself might have arisen in them from Joh 6:35, “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to Me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on Me shall never thirst:” but presently they start back again from faith: Joh 6:36; Joh 6:42, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then that He saith, I came down from heaven?” Those declarations are especially to be observed, by the hearing of which the Jews were inclined to believe: ch. Joh 7:40, “If any man thirst, let him come to Me and drink; he that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” “Many of the people, therefore, when they heard this saying, said, Of a truth this is the Prophet:” Joh 8:30, “He that sent Me is with Me; the Father hath not left Me alone, for I do always those things that please Him. As He spake these words, many believed on Him.”—πάντοτε, evermore) To this is to be referred the following verse, at its close, “never hunger—never thirst.”—τὸν ἄρτον τοῦτον, this bread) They still suppose that His speech is concerning the nutriment of the body; and it is this that they seek: Joh 6:26, “Ye seek Me—because ye did eat of the loaves.”

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh_6:34 ff. Πάντοτε] emphatically takes the lead.

The request is like that in Joh_4:15, but here, too, without irony (against Calvin, Bengel, Lampe), which would have implied unbelief in His power to give such bread. To explain the words as prompted by a dim presentiment concerning the higher gift (Lücke, B. Crusius, and most other expositors), is not in keeping with the stiffnecked antagonism of the Jews in the course of the following conversation. There is no trace of a further development of the supposed presentiment, nor of any approval and encouragement of it on the part of Jesus. The Jews, on the contrary, with their carnal minds, are quite indifferent whether anything supersensuous, and if so, what, is meant by that bread. They neither thought of an outward glory, which they ask for (Luthardt),for they could only understand, from the words of Jesus, something analogous to the manna, though of a higher kind, perhaps a magic food or means of life from heaven (Tholuck),nor had their thoughts risen to the spiritual nature of this mysterious bread. But, at any rate, they think that the higher manna, of which He speaks, would be a welcome gift to them, which they could always use. And they could easily suppose that He was capable of a still more miraculous distribution, who had even now so miraculously fed them with ordinary bread. Their unbelief (Joh_6:36) referred to Jesus Himself as that personal bread of life, to whom, indeed, as such, their carnal nature was closed.

Joh_6:35-36. Explanation and censure.

ἐγώ] with powerful emphasis. Comp. Joh_4:26.

ὁ ἄρτος τ. ζωῆς] ζωὴν διδοὺς τῷ κόσμῳ, Joh_6:33. Comp. Joh_6:68.

ὁ ἐρχόμ. πρός με] of a believing coming (Joh_5:40); comp. Joh_6:47; Joh_6:44-45; Joh_6:65. For ἐρχόμ. and πιστεύων, as also their correlatives οὐ μὴ πειν. and οὐ μὴ διψ., do not differ as antecedent and consequent (Weiss), but are only formally kept apart by means of the parallelism. This parallelism of the discourse, now become more excited, occasioned the addition of the οὐ μὴ διψήσῃ, which is out of keeping with the metaphor hitherto employed, and anticipates the subsequent turn which the discourse takes to the eating of the flesh and drinking of the blood. We must not imagine that by this a superiority to the manna is intended to be expressed, the manna being able to satisfy hunger only (Lücke); for both οὐ μὴ πειν. and οὐ μὴ διψ. signify the same thingthe everlasting satisfaction of the higher spiritual need. Comp. Isa_49:10.

ἀλλʼ εἶπον ὑμῖν] But I would have you told that, etc. Notice, therefore, that on ὅτι ἑωράκ., κ.τ.λ., does not refer to a previous declaration, as there is not such a one (Beza, Grotius, Bengel, Olshausen, B. Crusius, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, Baeumlein, Godet, and most others: to Joh_6:26; Lücke, De Wette: to Joh_6:37-40; Euthymius Zigabenus: to an unwritten statement; Ewald: to one in a supposed fragment, now lost, which preceded chap. 6; Brückner: to a reproof which runs through the whole Gospel); on the contrary, the statement is itself announced by εἶπον (dictum velim). See, for this use of the word, Bernhardy, p. 381; Kühner, II. § 443. 1. In like manner Joh_11:42. In classical Greek, very common in the Tragedians; see especially Herm. ad Viger. p. 746.

καὶ ἑωράκ. με κ. οὐ πιστ.] ye have even seen me (not simply heard of me, but even are eye-witnesses of my Messianic activity), and believe not. On the first καί, comp. Joh_9:37, and see generally Kühner, ad Xen. Mem. i. 3. 1; Baeumlein, Partik. p. 149 ff.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

4. Vv. 34-40. The two classes of hearers, the unbelievers and the believers.

Vv. 34, 35. “They said therefore to him: Lord, evermore give us this bread. 35. But Jesus said to them: I am the bread of life; he that comes to me shall never hunger, and he that believes on me shall never thirst.”

The Jews, still regarding the heavenly bread as a wonderful, but material food, declare themselves ready to follow Jesus always, if He will procure for them this food; and that daily. The evermore undoubtedly alludes to the gift of the manna which was renewed every morning. This bread: this food far higher than the manna itself. Here is the highest point of their carnal exaltation. But it is also the moment when Jesus breaks with them decidedly. Up to this moment, the questions and answers were directly connected with each other, and the particle οὖν, therefore, had indicated continuous progress. But the particle δέ of Joh 6:35, which seems to me to be the true reading, marks a sudden change in the course of the conversation; the ἀλλά, but, of Joh 6:36 will mark the complete rupture.

The words: “I am ...,” are the categorical answer to the: Give us, of the Jews: “What you ask is accomplished: this bread is Myself. It only remains to feed on it; and the means for this end is simply to come to me with a soul which hungers and thirsts for salvation.” Jesus finally explains His expression in Joh 6:27. The food which endures of which He there speaks is Himself; the work to be done in order to obtain it is faith in Him. The expression bread of life can signify: the bread which communicates life, but perhaps the relation between these two notions of bread and life is still closer. The true life, which is in God Himself, “the eternal life which was in the beginning with the Father” (1Jn 1:2), was incarnated in this visible being; it became in Him capable of being laid hold of, touched, tasted. But in order that this food may give us life, there must be action on our part: coming and believing.These two terms are not exactly synonymous: the first denotes the act of approaching Christ with the seriousness of a heart with a sense of sin; the second, the confiding eagerness with which this famished heart takes possession of the heavenly food in Him. The force of the negative οὐ μή can be rendered by: It is not to be feared that ever...Theοὐ πώποτε, never, is the answer to the τάντοτε, evermore, of Joh 6:34. The parallelism of the two clauses betrays a certain exaltation of feeling produced by the greatness of the fact declared. The figure of drinking does not properly suit the context: it is added to that of eating, perhaps because Jesus is thinking of the Passover supper. In the sequel of the discourse, we shall see that these two figurative expressions take each of them a meaning continually more distinct (Joh 6:53-57). And even here they are not absolutely identical. Hunger represents rather the feeling of weakness, of moral powerlessness; thirst, that of the sufferings of the conscience and the heart. Taken together, they express the deep uneasiness which drives the sinner to Jesus Christ. The appeasing of the thirst therefore refers rather to the peace; that of the hunger, to the new strength which the believer receives.

Coming, believing: these, then, are the conditions. But, adds Jesus with grief, it is precisely these conditions which are wanting in you.

Frédéric Louis Godet — Commentaries on Luke, John, Romans, and 1 Corinthians — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1870s–1890s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Lord, evermore give us this bread--speaking now with a certain reverence (as at Joh 6:25), the perpetuity of the manna floating perhaps in their minds, and much like the Samaritan woman, when her eyes were but half opened, "Sir, give Me this water," &c. (Joh 4:15).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 34. Lord, evermore give us this bread.] Either meaning, "Let the miracle of the manna be renewed, and continue among us for ever:" or, "Let that bread of which thou hast spoken, become our constant nourishment." The Jews expected that, when the Messiah should come, he would give them all manner of delicacies, and, among the rest, manna, wine, and spicy oil. From the following extract, we may see where Mohammed got his Paradise. "Many affirm, says Rab. Mayemon, that the hope of Israel is this: That the Messiah shall come and raise the dead; and they shall be gathered together in the garden of Eden, and shall eat and drink and satiate themselves all the days of the world. There the houses shall be all builded with precious stones; the beds shall be made of silk; and the rivers shall flow with wine and spicy oil. He made manna to descend for them, in which was all manner of tastes; and every Israelite found in it what his palate was chiefly pleased with. If he desired fat in it, he had it. In it, the young man tasted bread, the old man honey, and the children oil. So shall it be in the world to come, (i.e. the days of the Messiah.) He shall give Israel peace, and they shall sit down in the garden of Eden, and all nations shall behold their condition; as it is said, My servants shall eat, but ye shall be hungry, &c., Isa 65:13." See Lightfoot.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

34. Give us always this bread. There is no doubt that they speak ironically, to accuse Christ of vain boasting, when he said that he was able to give the bread of life. Thus wretched men, while they reject the promises of God, are not satisfied with this evil alone, but put Christ in their room, as if he were chargeable with their unbelief.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(34) Lord, evermore give us. . . .—Comp. Note on Joh_4:15. It would be better to read Sir for “Lord” here, as there. They, as the Samaritan woman, think of the satisfaction of physical need. They do not realise that man does not live by bread alone. The manna fell from heaven and gave life to their fathers; He has spoken of bread of God coming in the same way, and giving life. He has given them bread on earth, which they ate yesterday, but they hunger again to-day. Could He give them “evermore this bread?”

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34. Then said they] They said therefore.

Lord, evermore give us this bread] ‘Lord’ is too strong, and makes the request too much like the prayer of a humble believer. Our translators wisely vary the rendering of Kyrie, using sometimes ‘Lord,’ and sometimes ‘Sir.’ Here, as in the conversation with the Samaritan woman, ‘Sir’ would be better. Not that the request is ironical; it is not the mocking prayer of the sceptic. Rather it is the selfish petition of one whose beliefs and aspirations are low. As the Samaritan woman thought that the living water would at any rate be very useful (Joh_4:15), so these Jews think that the true bread is at least worth having. He fed them yesterday, and they are hungry again; He talks to them of food that endureth; it will be well to be evermore supplied with this food, which is perhaps another manna with greater sustaining powers. They do not disbelieve in His power, but in His mission.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life,.... Christ is so called, because he gives life to dead sinners: men in a state of nature are dead in trespasses and sins; and whatever they feed upon tends to death; Christ, the true bread, only gives life, which is conveyed by the word, and made effectual by the Spirit: and because he supports and maintains the life he gives; it is not in the power of a believer to support the spiritual life he has; nor can he live on anything short of Christ; and there is enough in Christ for him to live upon: and because he quickens, and makes the saints lively in the exercise of grace, and discharge of duty, and renews their spiritual strength, and secures for them eternal life.

He that cometh to me shall never hunger; not corporeally to hear him preach, or preached, or merely to his ordinances, to baptism, or the Lord's table; but so as to believe in him, feed, and live upon him, as the next clause explains it:

and he that believeth on me shall never thirst; and which is owing, not to the power and will of man, but to divine teachings, and the powerful drawings of the efficacious grace of God; see Joh 6:44. Now of such it is said, that they shall never hunger and thirst; which is true of them in this life, though not to be understood as there were no sinful desires in them; much less, that there are no spiritual hungerings and thirstings after they are come to Christ; but that they shall not desire any other food but Christ; they shall be satisfied with him; nor shall they hereafter be in a starving and famishing condition, or want any good thing: and in the other world there will be no desires after that which is sinful, nor indeed after outward ordinances, in order to enjoy communion with God in them, as now, for they will then be needless; nor shall they have any uneasy desires after Christ, and his grace, and the enjoyment of him, since he will be all in all to them.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

34 Then said they unto him, Lord, evermore give us this bread.

Ver. 34. Lord, evermore give us this bread] This they speak jeeringly, as the woman of Samaria did in like case, Joh 4:15.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

St. Augustine with all the Fathers, believed that the Jews did not understand this in its proper sense; but only understood a material bread, of superior excellence to the manna, which would preserve their health and life for ever (St. Augustine); or at least, a far more delicious bread, which they were to enjoy during the whole course of their lives.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Most interpreters agree that they spake this seriously, that is, that they were willing enough to have such bread (if any such were to be had); but yet not conceiving aright the nature and excellency of the bread our Saviour mentioned; and this occasioned his clear explication of it in the following verse.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

34. Lord—This title, like the Rabbi of Joh_6:25, indicates a yet remaining reverence for the Feeder of the five thousand.

Give us this bread—They are themselves in ambiguous suspense, arising from the Lord’s restrained language in the preceding verse. But whatever miraculous supply he has at command, they would like to receive, not transiently, like the late great repast, but permanently—evermore. In his next response the Lord relieves them from this ambiguity for ever.

In the remainder of this discourse (Joh_6:35-71) three groups of character clearly present themselves. In the foreground are the men who have thus far replied to him, the Jews of Joh_6:41. With them is the present contest lace to face. In the background is a body of converts by his miracles, the disciples of Joh_6:60 and Joh_6:66. A large minority of these are shaken and carried off into the ranks of his opposers. Aside of both these, foreground and background, are the twelve, intense spectators of the scene, awhile tremulous but finally firm.

To the opposers, confronting him, Jesus declares that theirs is not the sort of character that the Father has given to him for salvation, 35-47; and (not so much for them as for his disciples, his twelve, and for us) he describes himself as the dying Saviour, who gives us life by his death, under the successive figures of bread and flesh. The bread is suggested by the miraculous feeding; the body and flesh by his bodily walking the sea.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

They said therefore to him, Lord! His hearers have clearly been more impressed than ever with the extraordinary claims of the speaker. They have risen from the "Rabbi" of ver. 26 to "Kyrie," which implies, as the "Kyrie," or "Sir," or "Lord" of Joh_4:15, some advance in their tone of deference. The request that follows is neither ironical nor sarcastic, nor need it be as carnal in its spirit as the similar language of the woman of Samaria. (Joh_4:15) They have some dim notion of "doingthe works of God," and of some heavenly satisfaction given to their earthly wants. It may be that they imagine some material thing coming down out of heaven, more potent and lasting than the historic manna. Lord, evermore all times," "continuouslygive us this bread, of which you speak, and which as Son of man you are able to bestow, which will not be limited in quantity, which will prove to be the elixir of life, the food of the eternal life, and which will satisfy all our hunger, abolish our poverty, make us indifferent to death. A great prayer this, which Christ showed himself not unwilling to answer in his own way.

Vers. 34-40. The divergence between the thoughts of Jesus and those of the Jews.

A rupture was clearly at hand. The people had hopes of merely material blessing.

I THE JEWS ASK FOR THE BREAD FROM HEAVEN. "Lord, evermore give us this bread.

1. They ask for a continuous supply of it.

2. Their demand betrays a carnal spirit, that speaks of either sensual want, or covetousness, or the spirit of idleness; for no more labour would be expended upon the production of food.

II JESUS REVEALS HIMSELF PLAINLY AS THE BREAD OF LIFE. "I am the Bread of life.

1. He represents himself as the Sustainer of the life he communicates; for he is that "Eternal Life which was in the beginning with the Father". (1Jn_1:2) He thus presents the objective side of salvation.

2. Faith is the condition of its reception. "He that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

a. Faith as a coming suggests its more active aspect.

b. Faith as a believing its more restful aspect.

3. This Bread will bring the full satisfaction of all wants. The receptive spirit will have no desire for any other food than Christ. It will have

a. strength from the food, and

b. peace from the appeasing of the thirst.

III JESUS PLAINLY DECLARES THE UNBELIEF OF THE JEWS. "But I said unto you, Ye have seen me, and yet ye believe not.

1. They had asked to see, and their desire had been fully gratified.

2. Yet they refused to believe in him. An impression exists that if men could see Christ they should all surely believe in him. The Jews saw him from day to day, witnessed his miracles, heard his words, and yet were none the better for that immediate experience. We enjoy the higher blessing. "Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.

IV YET JESUS DECLARES THE ULTIMATE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF HIS FATHER"S WILL, IN THE FACE OF JEWISH UNBELIEF. "All that the Father giveth me shall reach me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.

1. He declares the Divine purpose, in virtue of which "all that the Father giveth his seed, his spouse, his Church, his inheritance shall be everlastingly saved. They will surely reach the Saviour.

2. He declares at once the subjective side of this salvation, and his attitude as a Redeemer toward those who come to him as their Refuge. He will in no wise cast them out of

a. his love;

b. his arms;

c. his Church;

d. his glory.

3. The security for the salvation of all who come to him. "For this is the will of him that sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day.

(1) Christ has no separate will from his Father.

(2) The Father"s will has a double aspect; it respects

(a) the delivery of his people from destruction;

(b) their restoration into the transfigured manhood of the resurrection.

4. The further confirmation of this security. "For this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which sooth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day." The previous verse presented the objective, this verse presents the subjective, side of this blessed truth.

(1) Men must see Christ in order to obtain everlasting life. They are naturally blind. The Spirit opens their eyes that they may see, not merely themselves, their sin, their helplessness; but Christ, his righteousness, his peace, his grace, his salvation.

(2) Men must trust in him to obtain everlasting life, There must be an actual reliance upon Christ.

(3) The end is everlasting life; not mere escape from hell, or the absence of loss.

(4) It is resurrection in glory. Christ will be the efficient Cause, as he is the Firstfruits of the resurrection.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Give us this bread - Meaning it still, in a literal sense: yet they seem now to be not far from believing.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Observe here, 1. How the carnal Jews hearing of the bread which Christ had commended so highly, and conceiving of it carnally, desire they may partake of it constantly; Lord, evermore give us this bread. The commendation of spiritual things may move the affections, and quicken the desires, of natural persons: but if their desires be not spiritual and serious, diligent and laborious, constant and abiding, they are no evidence of the truth of grace.

Observe, 2. Christ discovers another excellent effect of this bread of life, which he had been recommending; that such as feed of it shall never hunger more; that is, inordinately; after the perishing satisfactions of this world; but shall find an all-sufficient fulness in him, and complete refreshment from him, for the preserving and perpetuating of their spiritual life: He that cometh unto me shall never hunger, &c.

Observe, 3. How justly Christ upbraids the Jews for their obstinate infidelity: Ye have seen me, says our Saviour, yet ye believe not. Ye have seen me in the flesh, you have heard my doctrine, you have seen my miracles: I have done amongst you those works which never any man did, to convince you that I am the Messiah, yet you will not own me to be such, nor believe on me; Oh the strength of infidelity to be such, nor believe on me; Oh the strength of infidelity and unbelief! The devil has as great an advantage upon men by making them strong in unbelief, as God hath by making his people strong in faith.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34. Lord, evermore give us this bread. One cannot fail to see the resemblance to the case of the woman of Sychar. Compare the Lord's teachings there (John chap. 4) on the Water of Life.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

34. κύριε. ‘Lord’ is too strong, making the request too much like the prayer of a humble believer: as in Joh 4:11; Joh 4:15; Joh 4:19, ‘Sir’ would be better (see on Joh 4:11). Not that the request is ironical, the mocking prayer of the sceptic. Rather it is the selfish petition of those whose beliefs and aspirations are low. Like the Samaritan woman (Joh 4:15) they think that this wonderful food is at any rate worth having. He fed them yesterday, and they are hungry again. He speaks of bread that abideth, and it will be well to obtain it. But their only idea of ‘abiding’ is a supply constantly (πάντοτε) repeated, like the manna; and for this they ask in good faith. They do not disbelieve in His power, but in His mission.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34.] Ch. 4:15 is exactly parallel. The Jews understand this bread, as the Samaritan woman understood the water, to be some miraculous kind of sustenance which would bestow life everlasting:—perhaps they thought of the heavenly manna, which the Rabbis speak of as prepared for the just in the future world: see quotations in Lücke, 2:132, also Rev 2:17.

πάντοτε, emphatic:—not now only, but always.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34. The idea that the manna typified heavenly bread for the soul often appears in the Jewish commentaries. Wetstein quotes several passages in illustration, e.g. “sectio haec de manna est una ex praestantibus sectionibus legis quae non solum res gestas historice narrant, sed et typum continent uitae ac felicitatis hominis ultimae et aeternae.”1 Again, the comment in Bereshith R. lxxxii. 9 on the good man of Pro 12:2 is “saturabitur pane saeculi futuri.”

The same conception of heavenly bread for the soul is frequent in Philo. Wisdom offers οὐράνιος τροφή by means of λόγοι and δόγματα (de opif. mundi, § 56). The θεῖος λόγος divides equally among all men the heavenly food of the soul which Moses calls manna (Quis rer. div. hær. § 39). So in an earlier passage (§ 15) Philo speaks of the man who contemplates τὸ μάννα, τὸν θεῖον λόγον, τὴν οὐράνιον ψυχῆς φιλοθεάμονος ἄφθαρτον τροφήν. Again, the θεῖοι λόγοι are the manna, the heavenly food, which nourishes men (de congr. erud. gr. § 30). What nourishes the soul is ῥῆμα θεοῦ καὶ λόγος θεῖος, from which flow all kinds of wisdom (de prof. 25). Cf. also the question and answer in Legg. all. iii. 59 ὁρᾷς τῆς ψυχῆς τροφὴν οἵα ἐστι λόγος θεοῦ συνεχής. See further on v. 35.

More familiar than any of these passages 1Co 10:3, where Paul, allegorising the story of the manna, describes it as βρῶμα πνευματικόν, “spiritual food.”

The questioners who are represented by Jn. as arguing about the manna were probably acquainted with this idea of it as a type of heavenly food for the soul. So when Jesus says that the true Bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life, they do not cavil at such a thought. Indeed, they welcome it. This was what they were waiting for. Moses had given manna. The Messiah was to give a greater gift (see above on v. 31). So their answer is, “Give us evermore this bread.” Here, again, Jn. faithfully reproduces the theological temper and expectation of the times which he describes. The Jews would not have stumbled at the idea of spiritual food, of heavenly bread, as typified by the manna, and Jn. does not represent them as finding any fault with it. Their objection comes later (v. 41, where see note).

εἶπον οὖν πρὸς αὐτόν. The constr. is the same at v. 28. See on 2:3.

κύριε. They now address Jesus by this title of respect; see on 1:38, and cf. 4:11, 15, 19 for its use by the woman of Samaria, who says δός μοι (4:15), just as the inquirers here say δὸς ἡμῖν. See above on 6:26ff.

πάντοτε δὸς ἡμῖν, “give us always” (πάντοτε occurs again in Joh 7:6, Joh 8:29, Joh 11:42, Joh 12:8, Joh 18:20). They asked that they might be guaranteed a perpetual supply of the heavenly bread. More modest is the form of the petition for bread, earthly or heavenly, prescribed in Mat 6:11 τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον. It is only for to-day’s supply that Jesus teaches men to ask.

τὸν ἄρτον τοῦτον, “this bread,” superior to the manna, of which Jesus had spoken.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.